Review: Jazzpunk’s fun is in its silliness

Jazzpunk reinvents the way comedy works in video games

Have you ever wanted to interact with a realized, virtual world while laughing the entire time? Jazzpunk lets you do this.

From Necrophone Games and published by Adult Swim, this title is a hilarious take on classic 1960s-1970s spy thriller movies, played from the first-person perspective. If you’ve ever seen comedies like the Naked Gun with Leslie Nielsen, imagine Jazzpunk’s missions playing out in that film’s vein of silliness.

Each of the game’s levels is a mission, but you still have an entire world to explore. In each level you’ll have a set of objectives you need to accomplish in order to progress. And how do you progress? Finding great jokes that not only make you laugh but also make you think about player interaction, all through amusing wisecracks.

For example, in one puzzle, you’re tasked with getting past a door guarded by a camera. By drawing a picture of a nearby robot and hiding it over your face, the door unlocks.

The great thing about many of Jazzpunk’s jokes are they all feel organic and require some sort of input from the player. In a lot of comedy video games, it’s more about showing the jokes and having them told to you, usually through selecting some sort of dialogue. In Jazzpunk, pressing the action button is the joke’s set up and the reaction to your input is the punch line. This is a very unique way of approaching comedy in video games.

I don’t want to spoil all the jokes in the game but some of them can actually play out in multiple ways. On requisite playthroughs I always noticed something new in Jazzpunk, allowing me to experience certain jokes in a whole new light.

Hilarity is surely going on in this screenshot.

There’s even secret jokes that are actually full-blown mini-games. My personal favorite involved a wedding and 90s first-person shooter games. You’ll know what I’m talking about when you come across it.

The game’s art style is incredibly quirky and each character has a refreshingly distinct cartoony feel to them. Every character in the game is also fully voiced.

Jazzpunk joins a special category of first-person indie titles like The Stanley Parable, Gone Home, and Thirty Flights of Loving. These first-person games are more about exploring intricate worlds and completing unique objectives, rather than blasting enemies to pieces with guns.

Jazzpunk’s world is a joy to explore.

In Jazzpunk you’re exploring a land fueled by comedy and jokes. Around every corner you’ll encounter a new interesting character or object and wonder what its purpose in the game actually is.

As you can probably tell, I don’t have many problems with Jazzpunk. It runs really well on most computers (I own a 2009 iMac), but it might come off as short to some people. I feel as if the game were any longer, its experience might drag on too long. Sometimes shorter games are better because they contain very little filler.

Overall, Jazzpunk is the kind of game you really don’t want to miss out on.

Doesn’t that food look yummy?

It’s one of the most inventive titles of the year and will definitely be the kind of game people will continue to talk about months from now, especially when 2014 game of the year discussions start towards the end of the year.

Games featuring comedy don’t always work, but Jazzpunk is a true testament for how effective and unique comedy in video games can be.

My name is Perry Jackson and I'm an aspiring video game writer who wants to write about videogames for the rest of his life since they inspire me in terms of story, art and gameplay. You can find me here... read more, StickSkills.com and TouchArcade.comView author's profile